Austria

Austrian gun engineer and entrepreneur Gaston Glock has died at the age of 94. His company announced the news on Wednesday 27 December 2023.

“With visionary foresight, Gaston Glock built his company and led it to the top of the world with the internationally valued Glock Perfection. Until the very end, he was responsible for the strategic direction of the Glock group of companies and its employees,” the statement read.

Glock founded a weapons company, in 1963 in Deutsch-Wagram, Lower Austria, which now has branches world wide. Glock has a nearly 65% market share of the handguns in the U.S.. Glock owns 99% of the business through a trust that Forbes estimates is worth $1.5 billion in 2018.

Through his second wife Kathrin, who is more than 50 years his junior, Glock became connected to the horse world. The couple married in 2011.

In February 2012 the newly weds signed a 10-year old contract with Edward Gal, Hans Peter Minderhoud and Nicole Werner. He bought and built Glock Horse Performance Center in Oosterbeek for them, where they are still based today as free agents, according to latest reports.  The mogul also owns a yard in Austria, which was initially run by Marcel Schoenmakers until 2014.  They hosted a lavish CDI icompetition n Villach from 2012 through 2015.

Over the past decade, Glock supplied Gal and Minderhoud with a steady stream of horses: Undercover, Voice, Zonik, Dream Boy, Total U.S., Romanov, Johnson, to name just a few. The couple consistently competed on the Dutch team the past 10 years. They last represented The Netherlands together at the 2021 Olympic Games in Tokyo. –

https://www.eurodressage.com/2023/12/27/gaston-glock-passed-away

12 Comments

  1. James's avatar James says:

    RIP,though still,tis tupperware!

    I had no idea about the equine interests.

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  2. LSWCHP's avatar LSWCHP says:

    His second wife is 50 years his junior! I’m sure she loves either him or his money.

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    1. Shawn's avatar Shawn says:

      yeah she is using 100 dollar bills to wipe her tears and blow her nose right now

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      1. James's avatar James says:

        Or rolling em up to snort blow up her nose!

        To be honest,did not know that Glock was a family name

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    2. Dyspeptic Gunsmith's avatar Dyspeptic Gunsmith says:

      Every such female I’ve seen (30+ years younger) to engineers of my acquaintance who have cashed in big stock options has been a financial predator of the first order. Every single one.

      As I get older, I believe that men would be better off hiring a prostitute and dispensing with the institution of marriage completely. It would be cheaper in the long run – by orders of magnitude.

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  3. John M.'s avatar John M. says:

    Wow. That’s the end of an era. Thanks for posting.

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  4. D.E. Watters's avatar D.E. Watters says:

    Horst Wesp was alledgedly Glock’s lead designer. I wonder if Wesp regrets not getting any credit, particularly in contrast with his designs for other employers like Steyr and Walther.

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    1. Dyspeptic Gunsmith's avatar Dyspeptic Gunsmith says:

      Besides Glock, Wesp was the technical director of Steyr-Mannlicher when he was recruited by Walther, where he developed the P99 pistol, Walther’s first striker-fired pistol.

      Wesp has his name on several patents:

      https://patents.justia.com/inventor/horst-wesp

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      1. D.E. Watters's avatar D.E. Watters says:

        That is my point, we know Wesp had a hand in the design of the Steyr AUG and GB, as well as the Walther P99. But judging by patents, he suddenly became the lonely Maytag Repairman at Glock, as all of the pre-Gen 5 patents are in Gaston’s name.

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        1. John M.'s avatar John M. says:

          That’s interesting. I am not an expert in patent law, but I believe that wrongly crediting inventors can invalidate patents wholesale. I guess in order to do that you need to be willing to pay lawyers a bunch of money with the risk of flushing it all down the toilet if the court rules against you. I assume Glock has some particularly shark-like lawyers on speed dial. I certainly would.

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          1. D.E. Watters's avatar D.E. Watters says:

            It is moot now, as the original Glock patents have expired. To be fair, Beretta did the same thing with its designers for a while. I do know that Glock had to settle with Larry Seecamp when he tried to repatent Larry’s “Spring Extender” telescoping dual recoil spring design. Taking credit for other people’s work is a lot harder when they don’t work for you.

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